


I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You

by puzzlesthecat



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-06
Updated: 2015-09-19
Packaged: 2018-04-03 05:43:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4089109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/puzzlesthecat/pseuds/puzzlesthecat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Maria Hill couldn't tell Steve the whole truth, and the one time she definitely didn't hold back.</p><p>First fic on this site, my apologies in advance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. About Phil

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a little new at this, so just... be gentle, yeah?

Steve Rogers doesn’t exactly go missing after the Avengers fight in New York, but it’s not for lack of trying. After a month of beating up punching bags in a dingy basement and another month of riding around on his bike, trying to get back to 70 years ago (it feels like a personal fuck you from the universe that of all the modern inventions they have, a time machine isn’t one of them), he makes his way back to S.H.I.E.L.D, only to find that they’ve been tracking his location all along. 

“What did you expect, Steve?” Natasha smirks. “It’s S.H.I.E.L.D. They do shit like that.”

It’s not until later that he realizes the third person pronoun she uses, but he hears it in her voice anyway. Like he heard it in Stark’s. Steve’s still new enough in this world that he doesn’t know all the stories yet, hasn’t heard the full histories of the Hulk and Iron Man and how they came to know Fury, but the little bits he does hear are fractured enough for his military training to justify S.H.I.E.L.D.’s actions. This, however, feels personal.

“You’re a super soldier, Captain. And no matter what Barton’s been trying to sell you on the Indiana Jones front, heroes still don’t exist.”

Lieutenant Hill’s the one who explains it to him, both because she’s Fury’s second and because she’s the one who listens. Natasha told him once that if Coulson hadn’t died, he’d have been Steve’s liaison, same as Stark and all the rest. Coulson specialized in superheroes, Nat had said. Hill, not so much.

“I don’t see why it’s necessary. I wasn’t interested in joining S.H.I.E.L.D. yet.”

“Exactly.” The calmness in her voice is infuriating to hear. They’re walking down the maze of hallways to the Quinjet Bay, Hill’s boots stepping with unfailing precision despite her focus on her tablet. People, Steve discovers, part almost unconsciously for her, on autopilot as much as she is. It’s all a part of this efficient machine that Steve has now agreed to be in. He wonders whether he’ll fit.

“You were a liability. Now you’re an asset. But that doesn’t make you any less dangerous than you were before.”

“I don’t understand.”

Hill sighs. For the first time in their hour long tour of the Triskelion and the briefings on the various S.H.I.E.L.D. benefits, she stops. Steve has to pull himself back considerably not to bump into her. 

She turns to face him then. “Captain, we live in a world where the people with the best cards are almost guaranteed a win. Right now, you’re an ace. So are Stark and Banner. But you’re also a wild card, and we don’t know if your interests will always align with ours. What happens when we start depending on you so much that we forget how to play the game? What happens when you’re expected to play for our side and you don’t pull through?”

It takes Steve a while to work through the poker analogy, and by the time he does, he’s surprised Hill’s still there. Still looking up at him with the same cool blue eyes, and it strikes him how close they’re standing.

“I… think I may understand a bit better, Lieutenant.”

“Good.” The thing that ghosts around her mouth isn’t quite a smile, but Steve has an artist’s eye for such things, and his fingers twitch for a pencil. He’s not sure he could capture the fleeting radiance of that expression, but he thinks it’s not unfair to assume Hill’s real smile would be a thing of beauty. Too quickly though, it smooths and she turns, walking down the hallway at the same brisk pace, fingers flying over her tablet like the pause was another scheduled task she had to tick off her list. Steve, even with his super soldier legs, has to jog a bit to keep up, and by the time he does, Hill’s waving him through the double doors. 

“Here’s the Quinjet Bay. If you ever get sent on an op and mission control is empty, this is usually the place to go. Sometimes we brief directly on the jets to save time.” Hill stops and holds out her hand, where a junior agent rushes up to slap a Glock into her palm. 

“My gear?” 

“In the cockpit. They said to tell you they got out all the alien guts.”

“Good. Dismissed, Jonah.” Hill readies the gun and slips her tablet into her belt. “I guess this is it, Captain.”

Steve is a little taken aback. “A mission, now? I thought you said you were free this morning.”

“I was. The alert came a few minutes ago. I’ll be back within the week, and if there are any emergencies or questions, you can direct them to Romanov. Don’t call Barton. He’s on an op, and the phone bill would choke you back to death. And if there’s anything you need help with after, feel free to let me know.”

“Actually,” Steve has to half yell over the roar of wind coming in through the newly opened hangar doors. “there is. I want to do something for Coulson.”

Hill freezes for a second, the vulnerability in her expression so raw that Steve thinks he imagines it. “Excuse me?”

“I know I missed the funeral when I was… away. And I didn’t know him well, but he said some things that helped, and I’m sure he was a good guy. I’d like to help out in some way. They told me you’re the one who arranged the funeral and all his effects, so…” Steve shrugs. “If there’s anything I could do, for his family or for anything, I want to contribute. 

“That… That’s very…” Hill doesn’t seem like the speechless sort, but the tight hold on her gun says different. There’s something frantic in her gaze that contradicts her tone when she says, “That’s very nice of you. But it’s unnecessary.”

She’s halfway to the Quinjet when he yells after her. “Why? There must be something I can do for him. Why is it unnecessary?”

“Because Coulson…” Hill doesn’t shout, but her words travel downwind to him anyway, and he hears the dangerous edge in it, though it doesn’t seem directed towards him. The pause stretches on for too long before it ends with “Because Coulson didn’t have family. I’ll look into his old missions, see if there are any cases you can complete for him. How will that suit?”

She doesn’t wait for an answer, stepping onto the Quinjet and turning only once. It’s too far for Steve to hear her, but he doesn’t think he imagines the way her head tilts before the jet door closes, and the soft, “I’m sorry, Captain.” that follows. Nor can he imagine the reason for it.

........................................

It takes him years to understand. It takes more than that. 

It takes a hundred different missions of a hundred different sorts and Fury getting shot at and Bucky getting found, Fury getting resurrected and the helicarriers going down, for S.H.I.E.L.D. to fall and the Avengers to build a facility before the new Director in charge of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s rebirth contacts him. It takes a while for him to get over the betrayal he feels and burn through to the knowledge sitting underneath, that he does understand, after all.

That he always will.


	2. About Sharon Carter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s the nurse that lives across from him, coming up with a load of laundry in her hands. Steve thinks he must imagine the look that crosses her face at the sight of Hill, because in the strained light of the bare stairwell bulb, it almost resembles that of alarm.

There aren’t many things from Steve’s world that still exist for him (certainly not many that he wants to keep) so when he hears about an old, forties-style apartment being let out in the Washington suburbs, he grabs on to it with astounding ferocity.

“Captain, it’s just not practical.”

It’s clear Lieutenant Hill has more important things to do than to argue with Steve about his housing choices, and she’s not shy about showing it. He’s only been to her office on a handful of occasions before, but this is the first time he’s been asked to take a seat. Steve suspects this was less out of generosity than about Hill having to crane her neck up every time she makes a point. 

“A lot of things aren’t practical, Lieutenant. Doesn’t mean they don’t work out anyway.”

Hill sighs, the loose strands of hair blowing out from her face as she does. Closing the manila case file in front of her and swapping it for another from an enormous pile of them on her right, she reaches out for the tablet perched precariously on the edge of the desk. 

“Rogers,” she says, busily tapping away at it. “Look at this.”

Steve takes a while to work out the document she pulls up on screen. It appears to be a list of some sort, expertly organized, with names and dates and locations neatly printed out, some highlighted in red. 

“What am I looking at?” 

“That, Rogers, is a list of all the threats we’ve received against you in the past week. And these are just the ones who’ve our system has picked up. There’s a reason Barton and Romanov choose to stay in S.H.I.E.L.D. apartments while they’re in the city -so they don’t have to worry about protecting themselves when they’re off duty.”

It’s a little scarier after that, even for him. Thirty two names in all, with notes and side notes and links to scans and photos, every detail of every threat catalogued for him to see. This is a Maria Hill style folder, everything carefully annotated and analyzed, with the recommended actions to be taken for every possible move -he’s beginning to understand why she works so late at night. 

He hesitates then, of course he does. Steve’s not suicidal by any count, and to be honest, he finds this modern brand of stalking, this impersonally personal hostility more threatening than any of the HYDRA opposition back in the day-at least he’d understood why they’d disliked him then. But being woken up from the ice hasn’t exactly been a dream come true, and this century has already robbed so many things from him, Steve isn’t sure he’s up to losing one more. He pushes the tablet back to her, slow and sure.

“Then I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.”

Hill sets down her pen and stares. “Jesus, Rogers.”

He’s never heard this much exasperation in his name before.

“Hill.”

There’s a long, tense moment where they try to stare each other down, and Steve can’t tell who blinks first, but in the gathering quiet that follows, he’s the first to speak. 

“Lieutenant, I don’t want to waste any more of your time. I know it’s an… impractical choice, and I’m sorry if this makes things harder for you. But this is something that I have to do, with or without your approval.”

“It’s not my approval that needs to be-”

“Or Fury’s, for that matter.” Steve actually isn’t sure he’s allowed to do this, but he’s watched Bucky win at poker enough times that he knows the value of a good bluff. Hill’s eyes are unreadably and indescribably blue, and he has a feeling that she doesn’t stay quiet about this sort of thing because she has nothing to say, but he suspects something about her perceptions of him have just shifted a few milimeters from where they used to be, and they won’t be changing back.

He expects a counter argument of some sort, some vague attempt to postpone the conversation to a more advantageous time for her, but what Hill eventually says is, “Fine.”

“Sorry?”

“I’ll sort out the details with Fury,” she says, picking up her pen again. “We’ll probably have to check out this place and add some security measures, but it can be done within the week. Granted, you’ll be in Europe with Romanov for most of that, so that won’t affect you much.”

“I… Thank you, Lieutenant.” 

“No need, Captain. I’ll notify you when it’s done. Dismissed.”

_____________________

True to her word, Hill does handle things. By the time Steve returns from Eastern Europe with Natasha (he’s never going to a Russian bar with Nat ever again, no matter how much she claims it’s for ‘team-building purposes’), the apartment has been bought and upgraded with bulletproof windows and extra door locks. An e-notice from his bank tells him S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t light handed with the spending, but he figures he can deal with it. (Stark still insists, in his particularly annoying moods, that Steve dived into the ice for the sole purpose of ‘extreme tax evasion,’ which Steve supposes, is something only a lifelong billionaire could dream up)

It turns out there are other problems to living on his own that Steve can’t deal with by himself. After a few days of running to the cafe every time Nat calls to confirm a mission plan she emailed him, he finally asks for help in installing an internet connection. Hill, as his official liaison, spends an afternoon helping him negotiating with the wifi company, and later helps get him on a 3G phone plan (Jesus, Rogers. Didn’t Stark set it up for you?). She’s so terrifyingly efficient that by the time the sun sets through his windows, the gold light catches, not only on the wifi router, but also on the washing machine and refridgerator he hadn’t gotten around to getting himself.

“Thank you.” Steve says, for probably the hundredth time that day.

Hill eyes are cool, but there’s a satisfied twist to her lip as she looks around. “It’s my job, Captain. Which,” she says, already heading for the door, “I should be getting back to.”

“Now?”

“I’m on the Helicarrier tonight.”

“Let me walk you out.”

She doesn’t protest as he walks her down the hall, but there’s an eye roll when he insists on holding the door to the stairwell. Steve’s sure she’s about to say something cutting, when Hill stops in her steps. Steve tenses behind her. 

“Hill, is there- Oh. Good evening, Sharon.”

It’s the nurse that lives across from him, coming up with a load of laundry in her hands. Steve thinks he must imagine the look that crosses her face at the sight of Hill, because in the strained light of the bare stairwell bulb, it almost resembles that of alarm. But Sharon’s smile is warm and familiar as she steps back to let them pass, and he wonders what it was that made him think otherwise.

“Evening to you, too, Steve.”

Hill brushes past Sharon without comment, and doesn’t speak until they’re on the ground floor. There’s a car waiting outside, sleek and black and nondescript as any of SHIELD’s cars, but Hill doesn’t seem in a hurry to step in.

“Rogers.”

“Yes?”

“The woman we met on the stairs, you know her well?”

It’s an odd question to ask under any circumstance, and especially strange when coming from Hill’s lips. She’s not a talkative woman, and this is probably the most personal question she’s ever voiced in front of him. Clint’s given Steve a few pointers on modern courtship, and while this is the sort of thing he’d reword with waggled eyebrows, trying to emphasize the insinuation of the statement, Steve doesn’t quite think the look in Hill’s eyes is that of subtle jealousy.

“She lives across from me,” he says carefully, noting the narrowing of her eyes at the phrase. “We’ve talked a couple of times. Why?”

“Nothing important.” 

Steve raises an eyebrow. Nat has told him on a number of occasions exactly how terrible he is at lying -he could recognize the signs in anyone.

“She just… looks like somebody I know. It’s probably just a mistake.” Hill steps back towards the car, effortlessly shifting to avoid the driver as he pulls open the door for her. “Forget it, Steve. Please.”

Maybe it’s the burning red of sunset backlighting her silhouette, her hair a halo of dark fire against her cheekbones, or maybe it’s the way she says his first name, as if it’s slipped out on her tongue without her permission, or maybe it’s just that Steve has always been one to follow orders, especially polite pleas from beautiful women with gazes too deep to decipher. But he doesn’t question it further, just nods as she slips into the backseat, the driver slamming the door behind her.

Steve waves at the car as it slinks away down the street. He knows that, no matter the lie, Hill probably wasn’t secretly jealous of Sharon, but to be honest, he wouldn’t have minded if she was. 

______________________

After Maria saves him and Sam and Nat from the back of a HYDRA van, there’s still a lot to be done. Planning the fall of the world’s most discreet and resilient intelligence agencies is no small matter, and it’s a few hours past midnight when Steve gets the chance to talk to her alone.

“Sharon Carter.” He blurts out once Sam leaves for bed.

“What about her?”

“That private apartment was never that private, was it?” 

If she’s annoyed that he could fixate on such a petty thing in the throes of a crisis, Maria doesn’t call him on it. “It’s SHIELD, Steve. You had to have known we were watching you.”

Of course he knew. Steve isn’t naive, by any counts, and after the apartment was fitted out, he’d asked Natasha to go over the place for him, disabling most of the bugs and cameras and resetting the locks so none of SHIELD could waltz in unwelcomed. It had been part paranoia and part intense privacy at the time, but since Fury had shown up in his living room a few days ago and the ‘civilian nurse’ down the hall had turned out to be neither civilian nor a nurse. And anyway, knowing SHIELD was watching is very different from knowing HYDRA had been, too. 

He feels cheated somehow. Like the last tiny part of his life that he’d imagined to be separate from his uniform was robbed from him without ever realizing it. 

“Did you know about her when you okayed the apartment for me?” 

Maria’s holds his gaze. “It was Fury’s call,” she says with careful precision. “He wanted to keep an eye on you at all times, and after Romanoff disabled the surveillance, he told me he’d taken other measures. I didn’t ask for details until I met Sharon in that stairwell.”

“And you didn’t tell me.”

Steve knows, the second the words leave his mouth, that he’s crossed a line. Maria’s eyes narrow fractionally before her chin lifts and she’s cutting him apart with every word.

“I didn’t tell you, Captain, because Fury told me not to, and I assumed he had his reasons. And because it’s my job to decide which ones need to be questioned and which ones to trust him on. So god help me if I chose wrong, because the decisions I made may end up killing thousands of people tomorrow. And if that happens, I won’t need your judgement on whether or not you had your privacy: There’ll be enough bodies on the streets to prove you right.”

The silence that follows is heavy and thick, and Maria breathes as though she’s just run a race. Steve doesn’t quite know what to say or where to look, until Maria straightens, mask back in place. 

“That was out of line of me, Captain. Catch some sleep, it’s a big day tomorrow.”

She leaves him after that, the bunker door swinging shut behind her, sealing Steve in with the papers and the maps, and all the shattered consequences of Fury’s decisions and SHIELD’s shame. 

Steve drops into the chair and stares at the table. She’s right. For all of them, in their own definitions, it will be a big day tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled a LONG time about whether or not to post this, because it seems like I'm just randomly coming up with issues to fill the premise of this fic, but then again... I don't know. There's something about the way Steve reacts to having Fury in his apartment in TWS that makes me think he'd deeply resent SHIELD intruding on his privacy under other circumstances, and that he wouldn't be happy with being watched all along.
> 
> But anyways, if you have any other ideas on the possibilities of this or inconsistencies with character, please let me know in the comments.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! It's not as polished as I'd like, but graduation exams are a trying time.
> 
> Please leave me a comment to let me know how you feel about this. I'm a little new, and I'd appreciate the help.


End file.
